


Just Desert

by cookingwithcyanide



Category: Harris Burdick - Fandom, Original Work
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-09
Updated: 2016-05-09
Packaged: 2018-06-07 11:03:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6801106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cookingwithcyanide/pseuds/cookingwithcyanide
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>If you haven't heard of them, information about the Harris Burdock pictures can be found here:<br/>http://harrisburdickproject.weebly.com/<br/>A lot of english teachers use them as prompts for creative writing, and my class had a few days between units so we tried some out! The picture I used was "Just Desert" and the prompt was "She lowered the knife and it grew even brighter." Its some pretty creepy stuff.</p>
    </blockquote>





	Just Desert

**Author's Note:**

> If you haven't heard of them, information about the Harris Burdock pictures can be found here:  
> http://harrisburdickproject.weebly.com/  
> A lot of english teachers use them as prompts for creative writing, and my class had a few days between units so we tried some out! The picture I used was "Just Desert" and the prompt was "She lowered the knife and it grew even brighter." Its some pretty creepy stuff.

They were always told not to disturb the fruits before their time. ”God’s fruit,” they were called. “Never eat God’s fruit before he deems it ripe and ready.”

But Lorenna never was a patient child.

Weeks before the harvest was due, she begged her mother for permission to pick one of the pumpkins. It was an early bloomer, she’d insist. God had gifted it with the virtue of expedience, so surely it was good to eat! Alas, her mother was adamant. “Never eat God's fruit before he deems it ripe and ready,” she quipped, reciting the age-old mantra.

As days went by, Lorenna became obsessed, longing endlessly for the pumpkin. No matter how she wished to forget it, she could never get it off of her mind. Barely five days after first begging her mother for the pumpkin, Lorenna could no longer sleep at night. Afflicted with this insomnia, she was a man possessed; spending every waking moment- for that was all she had left- wandering listlessly around, skiving off chores, or idly staring out her window at the coveted fruit with an ennui unforeseen in the previously pious, hardworking girl.

On the sixth night, as Lorenna kept her endless vigil at her window, she saw the plump pumpkin glow like a second moon reflected on the earth. Shaking her head, rubbing her gritty, sleepless eyes, Lorenna gasped; surely this could not be happening? But surely it must- her longing soared to a peak in her chest and Lorenna’s feet scrambled down the stairs of their own accord. She could no longer control her own body; cool, damp soil between her bare toes as she sprinted through the field. Somewhere along the way she acquired a sharp kitchen knife, a rolling pin, and a large porcelain bowl, as if she were to bake a pie out of her beloved fruit, all held haphazardly in her long starched apron. She approached the pumpkin and it seemed to grow brighter and brighter with every step, beckoning her forward. Egging her on.

Lorenna cut the stem with trembling hands and brought the luminescent fruit to her face, pressing her cheeks and lips to the cold muddy surface with a frantic, visceral haste. The light flared, shooting dull red through closed eyelids. She ran. Away from her home, away from the farm, away from her community and everything that she’s ever known. She ran until the soft dirt beneath her feet turned to asphalt and she could hear the distant sound of automobiles over the rapid  _ slap slap slap _ of bare feet hitting pavement. Lorenna had never heard cars at night before, but took no time to linger.Everything was muffled, as though underwater. Under mud. Lorenna flew down the roadside with her pilfered produce until she came to a shuddering halt in front of an old, abandoned shed tangled in the brush. Lorenna entered the shed.

She placed the pumpkin on the dusty table in the center of the shed’s sole room, setting the bown and pin next to it. The knife shook in her trembling hand, gleaming with reflected light from the nearly blinding glow of the pumpkin. There was anticipation rising like sour bile in the back of her throat- she knew not what would happen when she cut the fruit, only that it would be the climax, the moment of no return. Lorenna shuddered uncontrollably. Her eyes burned in the unbearable glare of the fruit.

She lowered the knife and it grew even brighter.

Everything inside of her came to a halt.

  
The tip of the knife just dimpling the impossibly cool skin of the pumpkin-  _ she could never go home, what had she done?- _ piercing the flesh and spilling shards of frozen light onto the floor-  _ what would her mother think of what she’d done?-  _ half of the fruit cleaving off of the whole and shattering on the floor in an explosion of white-  _ oh dear God above, what had she DONE?!  _ The light flared around her like cold fire, she dropped to her knees,  _ screaMING- _


End file.
